Kate Whitehead

I miss travelling. It has been 13 weeks and three days since my last trip and I’m in withdrawal. I don’t miss hanging around the airport or negotiating elbow space in Economy, but I do miss the thrill of discovering somewhere new. And I know I’m not alone. The sense of adventure that comes with…

North Korea has barely been out of the news since Kim Jong-un took control of the regime following the death of his father Kim Jong-il in December 2011. From nuclear threats, public executions, forced labour camps and, most recently, a damning united Nations report, the headlines make clear that the isolated state is extremely volatile.

Derek Currie, one of the first Europeans to play professional football in Hong Kong, came to the city in 1970 and quickly became a local celebrity I was born in Glasgow, Scotland, on February 8, 1949. I suppose I was fated to come to the Far East because 1949 was the year Mao Zedong declared…

You have to be “a bit crazy” to want to go to the weird and wonderful places that excite the Lonely Planet founder

What is it? A brand new 266-room hotel on its own island (below) within the Venice lagoon. Isola delle Rose is an artificial island, built in the 19th century, and JW Marriott spent several years transforming what had been a sanatorium before the hotel opened in March.

London has seen a slew of turbo-hyped hotels come on line this year, with each one offering more than a place to sleep. These properties are destinations in their own right with restaurants and bars that have some of Europe’s best buzz.